Phil Reisman: If history is any indication, Bramson has fat chance

May 4, 2013

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But Bramson should take note that in the annals of Westchester politics, he is the third Democratic mayor of New Rochelle to run for county executive — and the other two guys lost.

In fact, they lost badly. They were wiped out.

First to go up in flames was Walter G.C. Otto, who was actually a former mayor when he ran against William F. Bleakley in 1938.

Otto’s claim to fame was that he presided over the Sept. 29, 1933, marriage of Lou Gehrig, who lived in New Rochelle when he played for the Yankees. The nuptials took place in the living room of Gehrig’s modest apartment at 5 Circuit Road. Afterward, Otto ordered the New Rochelle police to escort the newlyweds to the afternoon game against the Washington Senators.

This is a story has been recounted many times and is part of New Rochelle lore. It was depicted in the 1941 movie about Gehrig, “Pride of the Yankees,” which starred Gary Cooper. An obscure actor by the name of George Lessey had the honor of playing Otto.

Anyhow, Otto, who ran on the Democratic and American Labor Party lines, received 33 percent of the vote against the Republican Bleakley’s 66.5 percent. The other half-percent, about 1,000 votes, went to Jonathan C. Pierce, a Socialist. (Don’t forget this was the Great Depression.)

Bleakley was the first of eight county executives, a number that includes the current occupant of the office, Rob Astorino.

The other Democratic mayor to run for county executive and lose was Stanley W. Church, who held the mayoralty for 21 years, mostly during the 1940s and ’50s. Church, who died in 1990, is still revered.

Len Paduano, a former mayor and a Republican, said Church knew how to court Republicans in a Republican-dominated town.

“They loved him, said Paduano, 81. “He was a decent person. He had a lot of charisma. He was always elected.”

When Church was elected mayor the first time in the late 1930s, Paduano was just a little kid and a member of the city’s Boys Club.

“I presented him with a gavel that we made,” he recalled. “The picture was in the Standard-Star. They had the front page. I cut the picture out. I still have it somewhere.”

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William O’Shaughnessy, who owns New Rochelle’s twin radio stations WVOX-AM and WRTN-FM, said Church “looked and moved like a patrician. I don’t think he had a lot of money, but he moved with an elegance.

“He was known to be a ladies man (Church was married three times). He dressed well. He was the kind of guy — you didn’t see him in too many sports shirts.”

The artist Norman Rockwell was said to have posed Church for a cigarette advertisement, but I have never seen the ad. Like Otto, he had a slender connection to the film industry.

In the 1950 movie “The Great Jewel Robber,” about a notorious thief who was captured in New Rochelle, Church played himself.

“He just relished the role,” Paduano recalled .

Yes, Church was swell. But his charm and competence hardly helped him in 1957 when he threw his hat in the ring for county executive. Republican Edwin G. Michaelian won with 57.4 percent of the vote. He would win three more times.

A Democrat wasn’t elected in Westchester until 1973, when Al DelBello eked out a victory in a three-way race.

Incidentally, people really made a point of voting in the old days. For instance, in the 1957 county executive race, 282,821 voters went to the polls. Fewer than 200,000 voted in the last three elections going back to 2001.

As respected as they were locally, Otto and Church simply could not cash in on their popularity when they reached for the county seat of power. But in a GOP world, they were sacrificial lambs and probably knew it.

Bramson doesn’t have that problem. Far from it, in fact. Democrats outnumber Republicans by almost 2 to 1 these days.

On the other hand, nobody ever played Bramson in a movie. Same goes for Astorino.

Put these slender reeds together and they still wouldn’t fill out one of Stanley Church’s snappy suits.